If Steve Black fulfills his latest dreams, you will be able to hear the music from the new St. John Festival grounds at the Theovald Eric Moorehead Dock and Terminal at Enighed Pond quite clearly while sitting on your boat at the adjacent mangrove-lined Enighed Pond marinas.
While all island eyes have been focused on the controversial mega-yacht marina plan proposed for Coral Bay by off-island developers, long-time resident Black, who professes to have opened the first St. John supermarket in the late 20th century, decided he would build a marina for the west end of the island — right where he could keep an eye on it from his simple pink and purple, wood-frame high home on Caneel Hill overlooking Cruz Bay and Enighed.
Plans Presented to VIPA Executive Director Dowe
On Friday, September 12, Black and an associate, a prominent St. John real estate developer, presented drawings of Black’s plan for the development of a marina in the mangrove in the inner portion of the St. John port to Virgin Islands Port Authority Executive Director Carlton Dowe and VIPA staff.
The now-lush mangrove was planted as a mitigation area to replace vegetation lost in the dredging of the former salt pond when it was opened to the sea in the development of the port.
Black, one of the island’s original “continental” business entrepreneurs, has most recently been promoting his plan to create a concert and festival venue on the vacant VIPA between the marine terminal’s bulkhead and the public long-term parking lot near the Cruz Bay public tennis courts.
The Port Authority leadership was excited by the marina proposal, the Black associate told St. John Tradewinds before the meeting. “They want the whole engineering staff to hear the proposal.”
After the presentation by Black to the VIPA staff, the nascent plan apparently got bigger.
Two Marinas in One Pond
Actually, Black wants to build two marinas, one in what is now the inner mangrove mitigation area and the second consisting of a floating dock parallel to the mangrove shoreline along Fish Fry Road on the northeast side of the port adjacent to the proposed new St. John Fish Market and docking facility.
“They (VIPA) want me to expand the plan,” Black told St. John Tradewinds after the meeting. VIPA officials encouraged Black to expand the design of the proposed Fish Fry Road marina by extending the breakwater at the entrance to the Enighed Port further into Turner Bay, the fledgling marina developer said.
Black declined to make his preliminary plans available to St. John Tradewinds and said new renderings would be drafted to incorporate suggestions from the VIPA staff and executives to expand the project.
After presenting his plan to VIPA staff on St. Thomas, Black and his associate met with V.I. Port Authority Director Robert O’Connor Jr. on St. John where the preliminary proposal also received a warm reception, according to Black.
The fledgling project proposes to relocate the mangroves, which have successfully taken root in the mitigation area in the interior of the pond, to another mitigation area or to replant mangrove seedlings in a new mitigation area.
Marine Biologist Demurs
Amy Claire Dempsey, a local marine biologist who directed the creation of the mangrove mitigation area at Enighed for VIPA and is a paid consultant to the proposed Coral Bay marina, was succinct when asked for comment on the proposal to put a marina in her Enighed mangrove.
“I think they better check with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers,” the respected marine scientist emailed St. John Tradewinds. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) gave the federal approval for the permit to construction the port.
